Anderson Silva Would Move to Welterweight to Challenge Georges St-Pierre

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Anderson Silva Would Move to Welterweight to Challenge Georges St-Pierre

According to UFC President Dana White, “The Spider” is willing to shed the 15 pounds required to challenge St-Pierre for his 170-pound crown.

“Anderson would go to [170 pounds], too,” White revealed following Wednesday’s press conference in England. “Yeah, he said he’d do it. He says he can make [170] easy. It’s insane.”

White’s statement is quite bizarre. Typically, as fighters get up there in age – Silva clocks 38 in exactly two months, so he’s no spring chicken – they tend to move up in weight rather than down. In addition, Silva hasn’t competed at welterweight since losing to Yushin Okami at “Rumble on the Rock 8.” He weighed 174 pounds for that January 2006 contest.

Since the disqualification defeat, Silva has dominated the middleweight class while sprinkling in three light heavyweight scraps. The Brazilian’s sporadic dabbling in the 205-pound division is why most thought the superfight with reigning light heavyweight champion Jon Jones had a greater possibility of coming to fruition than with GSP.

It's not crazy to believe. Anderson came in at 202 against Bonnar, so I'm assuming he didn't cut weight for that fight to make LHW. If that's his fight weight, then there are many guys who cut from near 200 to make WW. It's just that he hasn't done it since 2006.

I find it more alarming that Okami was once 170 given that he's a huuuge MW. However, his frame is drastically different now than before, so I guess it's not as alarming.